This was at the heart of my question: if they're in the drop-most-bombs pole position, is the other stuff really that bad? Sounds like it might be.
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Combat Time . . . .
- Thread starter robav8r
- Start date
If green ink and dropping bombs on bad guys had a strong correlation to retention and job satisfaction, then the Air Force RPA guys should be number one with a bullet, but it's almost the opposite.
The Navy's in the same place. VFA has been by far the most active Navy TMS dropping bombs, but their pilots are leaving in droves despite big bonuses and near 100% DH screen rates.
I'd argue 15+ years of war deployments with no end in sight, including all the robbing Peter to pay Paul that comes with it, has taken a toll on not just morale, but the service culture across all military Aviation (AF, Navy, USMC). The former is a shorter term fix, the latter is harder.
The Navy's in the same place. VFA has been by far the most active Navy TMS dropping bombs, but their pilots are leaving in droves despite big bonuses and near 100% DH screen rates.
I'd argue 15+ years of war deployments with no end in sight, including all the robbing Peter to pay Paul that comes with it, has taken a toll on not just morale, but the service culture across all military Aviation (AF, Navy, USMC). The former is a shorter term fix, the latter is harder.
I will tell you that the "Crack Cocaine" that is Cyber / Space / Unmanned Everything is consuming more and more bandwidth. There are lots and lots of folks in the NCR that have never served or served a long time ago and have forgotten, I think, what manned platforms bring to a conflict. To them, its an investment in the "future" and reducing "risk" and giving DoD more "lethal" platforms without the consequences of losing humans in an armed conflict. I think we are very close to an institution (DoD) that will increasingly divest itself from the human aspect of warfare as much as possible going forward.
If that was really your point, you would have made it without the drive-by shooting of the (ridiculous) examples of what is considered falling short of expectations in each service.
No, AF pilots aren't upset and leaving because of lack of rides out to the flightline.
The "drive by shooting" includes true examples of differences in the services. How much the ridiculous examples contribute to genuine dissatisfaction is unknown and surely won't be admitted publicly by any AF pilots. If you can't admit that perhaps the AF pilots expectations are higher than that of other services pilots expectations, well than I'm not sure where we go from here.
If the AF is the early indicator of what might happen in the other services, why is it they are the leads in dissatisfaction? Is their situation worse or do they have higher expectations? Or both?
What's interesting is that there are ample publicly-admitted examples of the actual reasons that pilots are leaving the Air Force in droves (e.g. the lack of mission focus and the cancerous leadership as I've previously mentioned), and the two you specifically name (apparently the secret real reasons) don't even make the top 1,000 in my experience. They're cherry picked to make AF pilots look like screaming crybabies compared to, apparently, the Real Men of Army Aviation or the Real Men of Naval Aviation.
Yeah, I'm sure that some doof wearing an AF uniform once bitched about having to walk out to his airplane and I'm sure some unit decided once that Camp Shitstain wasn't up to their lodging standards. The massive error is then taking those examples and deciding that those feelings are widespread and, further, the source of the problem...even if the face of ample actual firsthand self-reported testimony from AF pilots about the cultural and organizational issues that are leading them toward the door.
If your desire was really to make the point about different expectations rather than to have a tacit wang-measuring exercise, it needn't have included these idiotic "examples" to do it.
We all know that Navy has the biggest "wangs" while the AF has the most dicks...
I'll be the first to admit that I'm hung like a friggin' mosquito. Somehow I've made it this far in life with just buying guns, driving Corvettes, and wearing big watches.
The UAV fixation in DC is worrying, with the vulnerabilities and limitations being waved off with little concern to reality.
That's because to the uninformed and inexperienced, it's "easy" and "risk free" and "cost effective."
The worrying thing is that a lot of the folks talking them up are in fact quite smart folks who have considerable experience even operationally, just not as aircrew, who in one sentence talk very discerningly about the fragility of some assets but then look to UAV's as a panacea.
I'm joining an Air Guard unit so I'm beginning to get a peak into AF culture. I've also done a joint tour with the AF (a HQ tour, not down range), so I now consider myself an expert all things AF (kidding).
Guys dropping ordnance on assholes enjoy doing it, no doubt. But with exception of the ISIS fight, in which the gloves are off, the last 8+ years in the 'Stan and Iraq, they have not been dropping much at all. Lots of loitering on station, bound by byzantine ROE, and frequently away from their families. I love giving the AF a hard time as the next guy, and make no mistake; they have bureaucracy that puts the Soviet Union to shame, but they also have a large number of genuine, red-blooded, steely eyed killers in their ranks. Guys who stay fit, work hard, are smart, and just want to put paid to a few of the assholes in the world. More than the other services, I feel that the aggressive mentality of AF guys is hindered by their service culture. As such, they want to leave - and I don't blame them a bit.
I'd be curious to know if the guys who are deployed to the ISIS fight, and delivering freedom, are having the same retention issues.
Guys dropping ordnance on assholes enjoy doing it, no doubt. But with exception of the ISIS fight, in which the gloves are off, the last 8+ years in the 'Stan and Iraq, they have not been dropping much at all. Lots of loitering on station, bound by byzantine ROE, and frequently away from their families. I love giving the AF a hard time as the next guy, and make no mistake; they have bureaucracy that puts the Soviet Union to shame, but they also have a large number of genuine, red-blooded, steely eyed killers in their ranks. Guys who stay fit, work hard, are smart, and just want to put paid to a few of the assholes in the world. More than the other services, I feel that the aggressive mentality of AF guys is hindered by their service culture. As such, they want to leave - and I don't blame them a bit.
I'd be curious to know if the guys who are deployed to the ISIS fight, and delivering freedom, are having the same retention issues.
All I know is that ever since WW-II and probably even in WW-I, combat missions were quantified by number of missions flown. The bombing flights ate up hours, but after 25 missions, you were done...if still alive.
In more recent times, I see missions are now often quantified by "combat hours" rather than "combat missions." I can only suspect this is an Air Force adjustment, due to the distance and time to target in recent strikes.
My total combat "hours" pale to theirs despite my many combat missions in the most hostile skies since WW-II. All I had to do was launch off the carrier, go feet dry for 15 minutes blowing up SAM sites and oil refineries, and returning to a ready deck in less than an hour... if I was lucky.
In more recent times, I see missions are now often quantified by "combat hours" rather than "combat missions." I can only suspect this is an Air Force adjustment, due to the distance and time to target in recent strikes.
My total combat "hours" pale to theirs despite my many combat missions in the most hostile skies since WW-II. All I had to do was launch off the carrier, go feet dry for 15 minutes blowing up SAM sites and oil refineries, and returning to a ready deck in less than an hour... if I was lucky.
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These days, it's the opposite. AF fighter and exped VAQ people rack up missions (and Strike/Flight Air Medals) like crazy like you describe. Us schmucks on Das Boot got/get multi-hour multi-tanker transits to/from the AOR back to Mom.
*checks logbook* My 2 shortest OEF missions were 5.9s; longest was a 7.6. That's a grand total of 3-4 fillups from an AF big-wing each time.
Fuck yeah!
Big watches!
Hooters girls dig big watches!
Pictured below...railroad grade [circa 1910] Illinois A. Lincoln, 18 size, 21 jewels in Dueber Railway Silverine case...
